[shiploversa]

this is just a small percentage of cruise ships to have hit the breakers

during the last 2 odd years

 

[poseidon9]

On the other hand lots of new cruise ships have recently entered the markets. It may be quite logical to scrap vessels of 1980s and 1990s. I see parallels to situation in the 1970s, where many old liners of the 1950s were scrapped, famous liners like Michelangelo and Raffaello were no longer needed on liner or cruise voyages and a vessel in such a young age like the Northern Star (Shaw Savill) ended up to be broken up just after a mere one decade in service.

 

[kohl57]

Not sure about that... the vessels that were scrapped in the 1970s were not cruise ships, most were not built for or designed for cruising. It was really more the end of the Liner Era and perhaps capped in 1977 with the end of Union-Castle, Chandris' Round the World Service and the final phase out of of the Finmare lines. It was not so much the end of ships but of the need for them as they had been originally built. It was also the end of subsidised lines like Finmare and the Australian migrant contract as well. Truly the End of an Era.

Today, is the winnowing out of cruise ships which are no longer considered economical in a post Covid cruise industry that is by no means back on its feet and seems incapable of turning a profit other than packing 5,000 aboard a single "ship" with "cover charge fees" on 80% of most every dining and entertainment option. I suppose one has to even to refer to such things as "ships" in that they float and are underway (as little as possible) but have to do a lot of squinting at the same time. One might get nostalgic over the end of a CARNIVAL ECSTASY after 30 years service... personally, I cannot even get over a ship would be so-named! Most of the ships in that photo actually had far longer service lives than any liner of the 1950s-70s. I seriously doubt they did anything as meaningful or useful as a PATRIS or a KARANJA.

So, no.. I shed all my tears for "my" FRANCE and RAFFAELLO and regret, to this day, not being able to have experience Union-Castle or AUSTRALIS. A CARNIVAL ECSTASY "on the beach".... not even sigh inducing I'm afraid.

Peter Kohler

 

[shiploversa]

Not sure about that... the vessels that were scrapped in the 1970s were not cruise ships, most were not built for or designed for cruising. It was really more the end of the Liner Era and perhaps capped in 1977 with the end of Union-Castle, Chandris' Round the World Service and the final phase out of of the Finmare lines. It was not so much the end of ships but of the need for them as they had been originally built. It was also the end of subsidised lines like Finmare and the Australian migrant contract as well. Truly the End of an Era.

Today, is the winnowing out of cruise ships which are no longer considered economical in a post Covid cruise industry that is by no means back on its feet and seems incapable of turning a profit other than packing 5,000 aboard a single "ship" with "cover charge fees" on 80% of most every dining and entertainment option. I suppose one has to even to refer to such things as "ships" in that they float and are underway (as little as possible) but have to do a lot of squinting at the same time. One might get nostalgic over the end of a CARNIVAL ECSTASY after 30 years service... personally, I cannot even get over a ship would be so-named! Most of the ships in that photo actually had far longer service lives than any liner of the 1950s-70s. I seriously doubt they did anything as meaningful or useful as a PATRIS or a KARANJA.

So, no.. I shed all my tears for "my" FRANCE and RAFFAELLO and regret, to this day, not being able to have experience Union-Castle or AUSTRALIS. A CARNIVAL ECSTASY "on the beach".... not even sigh inducing I'm afraid.

Peter Kohler

point well made - though to be fair the liner voyage days were their to take you to a destination where as the cruise ships of today are the destination themselves - what with slides - rope slings and climbing walls and long arches spanning over the side - and arcades - one can see the attraction in that - if you are thus minded - give me a deck chair a coke and a book to read - with a blanket over my legs and a sea breeze !

 

[poseidon9]

The problem of the 1970s was the oil price crisis, followed by inflation. Now we had the Corona crisis and again inflation.

In 1970s the earlier liner-generation started to become obsolate. Now the first generation of purpose built modern cruise ships has become obsolute as either really large mass-market mega ships or the specialized high-end luxury vessel (often marketed even as "yacht") are preferred. A cruise ship should nowadays boast as many balcony cabins as possible and the earlier generation of ships doesn't meet that request.

So, I see there a generation change. The modern cruise vessels have their advantages although I am fully sympathetic with the "real liners" of the past; the real liners had however their disadvantages, like comfort of 2nd class, cabin class, tourist class (in comparison with modern). The 1st class was wonderful and so were probably the prices for voyages. The modern liner produces excellent value for money. If you take the space to guests ratio, the modern mega liner is not that crowded either although of course some services on board may get on times a bit too crowded. If you have 220000 gt for 6000 passengers, it has actually about the same space per person as 22000 gt for 600 passengers or 2200 gt for 60 passengers.

 

[poseidon9]

There are certainly many people nostalgic about those cruise vessels now being scrapped. Many people have had their anniversaries, honeymoons, or simply holidays onboard.

Why doesn't someone turn one of these liners into a hotel? There is need for hotel rooms in many waterfront cities and a cruise ship could well provide valuable accommodations and maybe a bit cheaper room options for tourists? (Thinking cities like London, Amsterdam, NYC, etc.)

In Holland many smaller river vessels are used as hotels, often seasonally and it's nice to stay onboard (of course the great old Rotterdam-shiphotel is there, too). If one can operate a smaller vessel as a hotel, why not then a larger one. Or is it the bureaucracy making such realizations difficult? I know these projects used to be a bit problematic worldwide...

 

[taffe65]

Hotel accommodation badly needed in UK to house our "immigrants ", get them all onboard a fleet of them and sail them back to Albania or whatever country they originate from,ramming speed up the beach and job done! Only problem , finding a kamikaze crew to carry out my cunning plan.Any volunteers?😤

 

[shiploversa]

There are certainly many people nostalgic about those cruise vessels now being scrapped. Many people have had their anniversaries, honeymoons, or simply holidays onboard.

Why doesn't someone turn one of these liners into a hotel? There is need for hotel rooms in many waterfront cities and a cruise ship could well provide valuable accommodations and maybe a bit cheaper room options for tourists? (Thinking cities like London, Amsterdam, NYC, etc.)

In Holland many smaller river vessels are used as hotels, often seasonally and it's nice to stay onboard (of course the great old Rotterdam-shiphotel is there, too). If one can operate a smaller vessel as a hotel, why not then a larger one. Or is it the bureaucracy making such realizations difficult? I know these projects used to be a bit problematic worldwide...

the thing with turning any x cruise ship - old liners - into floating hotels - most of the time do not work out or become to expensive to maintain - their are exceptions like the mary - rotterdam - qe2 and others - but the amount of money to maintain a ship in as near a condition as one would like - is high - and normally the concept or interest wains over a few years - take the oriana the old atlas and to many to list - it just became a mess - and the appeal is more for ship minded people - back home we had a few tugs for example that were preserved - 5 at on time 2 or 3 naval vessels - and the public lost interest ... their are others scattered around the world - like the dolous - that are still going - its a difficult one to abscess as to what will work and what wouldn't - the mighty united states had a huge fund raising effort planned - marketed and sporadic attempts to turn it into a floating into what ever was the idea at any given time - and still she sits .....

 

[jock cardy]

On the other hand lots of new cruise ships have recently entered the markets. It may be quite logical to scrap vessels of 1980s and 1990s. I see parallels to situation in the 1970s, where many old liners of the 1950s were scrapped, famous liners like Michelangelo and Raffaello were no longer needed on liner or cruise voyages and a vessel in such a young age like the Northern Star (Shaw Savill) ended up to be broken up just after a mere one decade in service.

Most aka cruise ships, 50's 60' 70's , were built to get from A to B, i was on 2 P n O ones, Orcades / Orsova, they took immigrants from the U K to Aussie Kiwi, both ways, ie,through Suez or Panama, then in the Aussie summer they started cruising out of Sydney, for would you believe the womans magazine, Womans Weekly or somefing like that, cruises to Kiwi @ the Pacific islands, Fiji, Samoa etc etc., carried from memory, around 1200 passengers on the cruises, around 100 were women, as a single young seaman,,,it's wot you might call, " HAPPY DAZE " !